We’re expecting Boston’s population to number more than 700,000 residents by 2030.
“We must manage this growth to ensure that a bigger Boston is also a better Boston. We must plan for this growth, carefully balancing needed increases in density with open space and other amenities to ensure that quality of life in our neighborhoods remains high. Most importantly, we must ensure that this growth creates opportunities for people at all income levels.”
The Challenge
We want Boston to be a place that all residents can call home but housing in Boston is becoming unaffordable for many, especially middle-income households.
Housing a Changing City: Boston 2030
The Opportunity
There is internal and external momentum to make an impact on the middle income housing market. With the Mayor’s support, the City of Boston is in the largest development boom in it’s history. The City has reached $1.65 billion in housing starts in the first 6 months of calendar year 2015. Nearly half of all housing in the first 3 months will be affordable to middle income buyers, up from 26% in 2014.
Through the support of a Bloomberg Philanthropies Innovation Team grant, the City of Boston has started the Housing Innovation Lab to tackle the challenge of keeping Boston affordable to middle income families.
The Approach
There is an amazing amount of expertise and knowledge about housing affordability and our team is dedicated to testing these ideas in Boston. We have created a Housing Innovation Lab to explore, experiment and evaluate three broad approaches to keep middle income housing affordable to Boston residents:
Lowering the Cost to Build
Lowering the Cost to Buy
Lowering the Cost to Own
As we prototype the highest impact and most feasible ideas in the three core areas, we aim to provide the City with a better understanding of the levers best pulled to create and maintain a solid middle income housing stock.
Our Team
Nigel Jacob, Director
Nigel Jacob is the Director of Boston’s i-team and Co-founder of the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics, a civic innovation incubator and R&D Lab within Boston’s City Hall. Nigel works to develop new models of innovation for cities in the 21st century. Prior to joining the City of Boston in 2006, Nigel worked for and launched a series of technology start-ups in the Boston area. He is also the Urban Technologist in Residence at Living Cities, a board member at organizations such as Code For America and coUrbanize, and is an Executive-in-Residence at Boston University. Nigel’s work has been written about extensively and has earned Nigel a number of awards including being named a Public Official of the year in 2011 by Governing Magazine, a Whitehouse Champion of Change and the Tribeca Disruptive Innovation award for 2012.
Susan Nguyen, Program Co-Manager
Susan is the Program Co-Manager for the i-team. She develops new methods of innovation to deliver quality products and services to residents and visitors. Susan previously worked as a Program Director for the Mayor’s Office of New Urban Mechanics. Her background is in city planning, economics, design, and public engagement. Prior to joining the City of Boston, Susan earned her Masters in Urban Planning from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design and BA from Harvard College. Susan has some long standing (overdue) goals: build a mobile telescope, start a cooking blog, read for leisure again (recommendations encouraged!) + learn how to swim.
contact: [email protected] – @SusanHNguyen
Marcy Ostberg, Program Co-Manager
Marcy is thrilled to join Boston’s i-team as a Program Co-Manager, bringing her background in civic innovation, urban policy and education. She previously worked as a Strategic Project Manager at the Right Question Institute advancing a question formulation strategy used for problem solving in innovation, critical thinking in education and self-advocacy in social services. Previously she worked as a High School Biology Teacher at the Boston Day & Evening Academy. Her experiences as an urban educator drove her to explore innovative solutions to systemic and complex problems that face low-income families. Marcy holds a MA in Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning from Tufts University, an MEd in Secondary Biology from Franklin Pierce University, and a BS in Kinesiology from Gordon College.
contact: [email protected] – @MarcyOstberg
Sabrina Dorsainvil, Civic Designer
Sabrina Dorsainvil is a Boston-based designer and illustrator whose work ranges from playful drawings to the development of strategic, human centered design solutions used to address complex issues such as housing, healthcare and human rights. She is fascinated by people; the way they move, speak, touch, interact and experience environments, objects and each other. She has worked with community based organizations, large corporate institutions, and international projects on issues regarding social, spatial and environmental justice. Her role as i-team civic designer will employ human centered design to assist in addressing the mayoral challenge of keeping Boston affordable to middle income families. Sabrina holds a BFA in Industrial Design for Massachusetts College of Art and Design and an MS in Design and Urban Ecologies from Parsons the New School.
contact: [email protected] – @oh_sabeedee
Max Stearns, Housing Innovation Fellow
Max is the Housing Innovation Fellow for the i-Team. His passion lies in creating and building tools, which empower those in need. Previously, Max served as a Field Team Leader with the AmeriCorps NCCC Southern Region. His time with AmeriCorps granted exposure to the many needs of urban environments and inspired Max to focus his energy on improving the quality of life for all urbanites. His background is in community development, affordable home construction, and neighborhood revitalization. Max holds a BA from The Ohio State University.
contact: [email protected]
Our Partners
We hope to learn from the housing experts in Boston and around the globe to start developing solutions as well as academics, developers, policy experts and others researching this challenge. We are always looking to expand our list of partners.
Current Organizations/Departments:
If you are interested in sharing your experience and ideas we would love to hear from you at [email protected]. Follow the Housing Innovation Lab on twitter for updates: @newurbanmechs #housingiLAB
Press
Five things you should know about Susan Nguyen and Marcy Ostberg
Boston might be enjoying a historic building boom, but its middle class is missing out. Susan Nguyen and Marcy Ostberg are trying to figure out how to change that. Nguyen and Ostberg are coleaders of the city’s Housing Innovation Lab, a project that Mayor Martin J. Walsh launched in October to find new ways to drive down the cost of buying, building, and owning a home in Boston.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/11/27/five-things-you-should-know-about-susan-nguyen-and-marcy-ostberg/GSzzIKTlAIZNU2QZaXKCRO/story.html
Enthusiasm and Ideas for Future of Jamaica Plain and Roxbury Border
The English High School cafeteria was filled and bubbling with energy, enthusiasm and ideas at the second workshop for the JP-Rox Plan Washington Street corridor initiative Nov. 4. http://www.jamaicaplainnews.com/2015/11/08/enthusiasm-and-ideas-for-future-of-jamaica-plain-and-roxbury-border/15178
Gazette: JP resident tapped for a City Urban Mechanic position
Sabrina Dorsainvil, a Jamaica Plain resident, was recently hired for the position of civic designer http://jamaicaplaingazette.com/2015/11/06/jp-resident-tapped-for-a-city-urban-mechanic-position/
The Daily Free Press: Innovation Lab to solve middle income housing challenges
The Housing Innovation Lab aims to bring innovative thinking to help solve middle income housing challenges, Boston Mayor Martin Walsh announced Monday.
http://dailyfreepress.com/
Boston Launches New Team To Solve City’s Worsening Housing Affordability Problems
http://www.wbur.org/2015/10/20/boston-housing-innovation-lab
Creating Housing for Everyone in Boston: The Housing Innovation Lab
The three-person I-Team of the Boston’s Housing Innovation Lab has quite the challenge — keep Boston a city that isn’t just for the rich and the poor — and places that the working middle class can still call home.
http://www.jamaicaplainnews.com/2015/10/17/creating-housing-for-everyone-in-boston-the-housing-innovation-lab/14412
Boston gets $1.35 million grant for ‘Housing Innovation Lab’
https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2014/12/15/boston-gets-bloomberg-grant-research-housing-innovation/gL5dUGMGuiFr5G3TvIMWXL/story.html
The New Housing Innovation Lab Will Support Affordable Living With T Access
But finding the right people to fill out the team is priority number one.
http://bostinno.streetwise.co/2014/12/16/the-new-housing-innovation-lab-will-support-affordable-living-with-t-access/
Boston Tackles Housing with Dedicated Innovation Lab
Part of a $1.35 million grant will be used by the city’s Housing Innovation Lab to increase Boston’s housing stock by 53,000 units.
http://www.govtech.com/dc/articles/Boston-Tackles-Housing-with-Dedicated-Innovation-Lab.html
Inside Bloomberg’s Plan To Spread The Gospel Of Urban Innovation
The billionaire former New York mayor is funding urban innovation, in the hopes of finding new solutions to the problems that plague cities around the world.
http://www.fastcoexist.com/3045343/inside-bloombergs-plan-to-spread-the-gospel-of-urban-innovation